They're Wrong About You
by MissPiggy99
Summary: She was a mess, he looked like death itself, so why where they drawn together at the very moment they were falling apart? Ron is with Lavender, and it's breaking Hermione's heart, Draco can't fix the vanishing cabinet and is for some reason drawn to a girl he has grown up hating.. Three short Dramione scenes, they all take place during Half Blood Prince. Not a great summary, sorry!
1. Chapter 1

**Dramione**

They're Wrong About You.

**A/N – Just a fanfic about three Dramione scenes. They all take place during Half Blood Prince. **_**If it is from Draco's POV then it is in Italics,**_** if it's Hermione's POV then they are in normal writing. (Disclaimer – I don't own any characters, they belong to the wonderful JKR). Enjoy! **

They were chanting his name over and over and each time it was being drummed into my heart like a nail in a wall. Ron. Ron. Ron. Ron.

It was as if the universe was screaming at me, go to him Hermione, tell him that it's you he's been looking for.

Harry was beaming at me knowingly through the crowds of cheering fans, Ron wouldn't have been the King of the Gryffindor Quidditch match if it weren't for the two of us. Not that he would ever know that.

I caught Ron's eyes from across the room, he grinned like the Cheshire cat and jumped down off the table in the middle of the common room.

Was he coming over to me? Now was my chance. I would tell him, oh God, I would tell him. How do you start that conversation? Do I say something? Do I kiss him? How do I do it?

I began to push through the crowd, and I stumbled into the clearer part next to Harry, I gave him a nervous smile but he seemed to be gawping at something across the room.

I followed his gaze and my stomach dropped. Ron was there as I had expected, only I could barely see him, he had his face attached to Lavender Brown.

I couldn't believe it, we had been so close these past few months, but not like usual, a different kind of close. A close that had made my knees weak, and butterflies flutter around inside me. I thought he had felt it to.

I had to get away from the scene, tears were welling up in my eyes and I couldn't hold them back any longer.

I pushed my way out of the common room, through all the cheers and whoops. It was as if they were all laughing at me, as if they loved the fact that the nerdy girl got hurt, again.

I ran through the halls, stumbling along, but with every step I took, I could feel my heart breaking, and the pain was crippling.

I ran until I had reached a set of stairs that led down into an old disused corridor at the bottom of the school and I collapsed. I could no longer hear the loud victory calls of Gryffindor, I couldn't hear anything.

I needed to do something, anything to take my mind off of the party. I conjured up a few small birds and let them fly around my head, filling the silence with gentle chirps.

I felt the tears building back up but this time I just let them flow, trying to hold them back was as futile as trying to defy gravity.

I sat and wept for what seemed like hours, my tears now silent, but just as frequent, I heard someone's footsteps and – assuming them to be Harry's – looked up, my tears had no intention of stopping…

_The room was eerily silent, I had been in there for almost twelve hours straight now, not that anyone had tried to find me, they all knew I was beyond help by now._

_I had barely spoken to anyone at Hogwarts so far this year. Making conversation when absolutely necessary, answering teachers and only speaking when spoken to directly. Even then I had kept my answers blunt and to the point._

_I was alone._

_With the exception of Professor Snape, but he was there only for his own benefit. He looked down on me, everyone did. The other students avoid me, the teachers can't stand me, even the other Death Eaters saw me incapable because I had been here almost six months and had made no progress._

_I was exhausted, torn apart from failure, scared of what would happen should I fail. It was too much. I needed some sleep, I was in a very fragile state, if so much as one more tiny thing went wrong, I would completely fall apart. _

_I always walked the same way to get back to the Slytherin common rooms, I went through a corridor at the bottom of the castle, it was disused and allowed me to avoid people – even if it did take a lot longer, it gave me time to think._

_I gradually made my way along the halls, Gryffindor's were cheering, and Slytherin's were sulking. The Quidditch match was on today, I didn't go. Why would I? I no longer cared about the activities or people at Hogwarts, there was a time that I would have done whatever it took to be the one to beat Potter, catch the snitch, win the match. All I really needed was to get the Vanishing Cabinet to work._

_I couldn't even do that._

_I was on the verge of giving up, hiding somewhere in the depths of the castle, no one to judge me, nothing to kill me. I would give anything to have something to distract me from my life, to blur out the world._

_I got past the masses of excited students and came to a corridor with stairs at the end, down those stairs were the many halls that nobody cared about, they were quite nice, maybe a bit cold, but best of all, they gave me a sense of peace. _

_I approached the stairs and made my way down step by step, the further down I went, the more I could hear two sounds, one was the sound of someone crying but the other was something rather odd… birds._

_My feet stopped mid step as Granger sat at the bottom of the winding stairs. She had conjured up some random birds that flew around her head chirping. _

_As for Granger herself, well, she looked awful._

_Her skin was marred by the stream of tears cutting down her face, her jumper was frayed at the sleeves from what seemed like constant picking at it, it was falling off her shoulders and her hair was falling out of the many pins trying to restrain it. _

_She looked a mess._

Draco stared down at me for a good 10 seconds, it gave me time to take in his appearance, for some strange reason, Draco had always fascinated me, he may have been horrible to almost everyone, but he had so many walls up that it made me want to know more.

He looked different.

He was slightly hunched over and the dark bags under his eyes contrasted hugely with the sickly pale white of his skin. His hair had darkened to a muddy blonde. His trousers were covered in dust and his shirt was untucked and crumpled with the sleeves hanging loosely down his arms. To be honest, he seemed to have lost his venom, his will to try. Not that I could talk, I was sat at the bottom of a spiralling stairwell crying my eyes out.

_I stared at her for a moment, taking in her dishevelled look, in all honesty, I felt like she was doing just as bad as me, it made me want to sit and break down next to the girl that I had hated, yet secretly envied, for years._

_Instead I did the only thing I knew how, I sat down next to her and began to erode her every happiness._

"_What's the matter?" I sneered weakly "Weasel didn't make you a knitted jumper? Too poor to care I suppose."_

_She just stared at me blankly as if I wasn't even there._

"_Potter ditched you too? Figured he would at some point, it never made any sense for him to like you." I tried to hiss "The blood traitor I can understand, but a Pureblood? Plain wrong, that's what it is." _

_She screwed her eyebrows together and looked me right in the eyes, tears and all. What was her problem? I met her confused stare with what I intended to be an icy cold one, it came out wrong though, but I wouldn't be the one to look away._

He began pelting me with a few insults but I could tell he wasn't putting any effort into it. Something was off about him, he didn't have his usual cocky mannerisms, he wasn't putting any real venom into it, he didn't care, the question was… why?

My tears had no intention of stopping but I furrowed my eyebrows and stared at him, looking deep into his tired green eyes. He was gone, a pit of nothingness stared back at me, and his walls were up too high for me to see him.

He met my gaze with an attempt at a glare, all that came out was the look of someone who needed saving.

"What happened to you Draco?" I asked, not expecting any form of answer. "Why are your walls breaking down?"

I gave a little gasp in astonishment at what I had just said, at the mention of broken things, I remembered my heart was ripping up my soul.

Fresh tears spilled down my cheeks and my silent cries turned into muffled sobs. Draco just stared at me, not knowing what to do, and why should he? Nobody could help me. Nobody except Ron. Yet for a short moment, I had forgotten the pain I was in, how had Draco done that? By simply being there?

Surely something like that would be impossible…

_There was a silence, one where even the wind seemed to die out into nothingness. All I could hear was Granger crying and birds chirping. I sat watching her, watching her fall apart. _

_We sat like that for 7 minutes. It wasn't bad though, it was actually quite relaxing, Granger had a steady stream of tears but her sobs were now silent. _

_I couldn't deal with the loneliness anymore. It was so comforting just sitting with an actual person, even Granger. I thought about what she had said. What had happened to me? _

_Voldemort. _

_That's what happened. _

_But her comment on my walls, I knew they were there, I had built them over the years, were they breaking? Was it that obvious?_

_I was tired. Not only physically, but mentally. I couldn't do it or much longer, the constant pressure, death eaters breathing down my neck, the inevitable fact that I had to kill or be killed._

_Maybe it would just be easier. Let Voldemort kill me. No one would really miss me, maybe my Mother, not my Father, I was always just a tool for him to use to get to the top._

_She was right, the walls I had built were crumbling, and the only one there to witness it was Granger._

_So why was I still pretending?_

The silence was screaming n my ears, but it wasn't an awkward one, despite the fact that I was crying and Draco looked like he was about to die, it was calming. Something as simple as his presence was numbing the pain Ron had caused.

In that moment I didn't care about the past, I didn't care about all the names he had called me, I didn't care about all the times I had said I had hated him. I didn't care.

Because right here, right now, he was the one sitting next to me while I cried. He wasn't saying anything comforting like Harry would, he wasn't trying to make me laugh like Ron would. But he was there, making me feel like I wasn't so alone.

I couldn't stop crying, it seemed like I would never stop. I had no idea what I was going to do later. I would have to face Ron. He was one of my best friends. I could hardly cut him out of my life like that.

Perhaps Lavender is just a one night thing. Perhaps not. I just don't know. But if Ron did feel the way I do, he wouldn't even be looking at her. He's the only guy I have ever loved, ever been connected with romantically.

Except from Viktor. I don't know what happened there, I just needed to show people that I was more than what I seemed.

Viktor was long gone, and now Ron seemed a long way away. So why was I feeling content?

_Why am I still pretending?_

_There was no point on putting on the show anymore, no point in trying to be mean and cocky and above everyone else. It was just Granger and me, actually, just me, I blew my chances of being friends with Granger in Second year when I called her a… well, I guess it doesn't really matter anymore. _

_Voldemort would kill me soon if I didn't get that cabinet to work. Aunt Bella had contacted me telling me that they were all growing impatient and that she was sending something a cursed necklace to try and help but I needed to hurry._

_That was pretty much it, he would kill me if I didn't hurry. Father would punish me for taking so long even if I did succeed, I wasn't going to come out of this unharmed. To be honest, I feared father's punishment more._

_I could feel tears welling up in my eyes, no. I couldn't cry. I needed to distract myself. I swallowed the lump forming in my throat and broke the silence._

"I like the birds, they're beautiful, it must have been difficult to do something that delicate."

I looked at him, I looked into his eyes and instead of a blank face, all I could see was fear, pain and hurt. Draco had taken down his walls, he was as vulnerable as me.

"Thank you." I sniffed "It was nothing, just a simple enchantment."

We exchanged weak smiles and gazed down at our legs. Mine were parted at the feet but my knees were together with my arms resting on them. Draco had his fully apart, his elbows resting on each knee. One of his arms hung limply between his legs and the other hand cradles the side of his face, tangled in his messy blonde hair.

"More intricate than most people are capable of," he paused slightly as if contemplating his next words "At least you aren't vomiting slugs."

A small laugh escaped my mouth and Malfoy chuckled as well. The small outbursts of laughter grew and within a minute we were both giggling uncontrollably, I still had tears rolling down my cheeks, but for some reason neither of us could stop laughing.

_I was laughing, actually laughing, uncontrollable snorts and chuckles erupted from the two of us and although I was still in danger of Voldemort, and she was still crying over Weasley, it was nice. We couldn't stop._

_It turned into the kind of silent laughs that pinched your stomach and left you breathless._

_After what seemed like years of laughing and catching our breath, we fell into silence again. It was a nice silence, we were both smiling, but Granger's smile still seemed to start fading, she was still crying._

_Weasley really must have done something huge this time. I had never seen her this upset. She glanced over at me and I returned her gaze, I was suddenly aware of how little distance there was between us, How close our faces were._

_Granger, of all the people I could have been with, I was with a muggle born, but the weird thing was, I didn't care. I hadn't been anywhere close to contentment, yet there I was laughing so hard my stomach hurt._

I don't know how it happened, one minute I was laughing and the next, I'm pressing my lips against Draco Malfoy's, a guy that I have hated for 5 years of my life.

The thing is, I liked it.

_Granger tasted like a mixture of vanilla and cherry's, I don't know what I was doing, Granger, a muggle born, a person that my father would torture me for even looking at._

_The worst part was, I didn't dislike it._

For some strange reason, neither of us pulled away, his shaky hand found the side of my face and my trembling arms snaked around his neck.

We both leaned into the kiss, as if there would be no end, no problems, and no consequences. The rest of Hogwarts seemed to blur out of existence, there was no Harry, no Dumbledore, no Voldemort, and no Ron.

_Despite it being practically impossible, I moved closer to Granger, there was no space between us, as if even one little crack of air would make the moment end, and I didn't want it to._

_I knew that I could be killed for doing this, for losing concentration on the cabinet, for fraternising with a muggle born, but I didn't care. _

_I felt so close to Granger that I never wanted to let go. There may have been my father's voice in my head telling me that this was wrong and that I should be repulsed, but I didn't want to stop. I just kept pushing my lips against hers, letting her scent consume me._

It was oddly comforting, being this close to Draco. I couldn't have imagined anybody else having sat down next to me, I was strangely glad that it was Malfoy with me in this moment.

There was something about the way I had forgotten everything else that was appealing. Something about the way his mouth felt that made me feel at home.

I knew that I should be pulling away, crying about Ron or doing my homework or helping Harry figure out how to find the Horcruxes, but I wanted to stay like this forever, stay at the bottom of these stairs with Malfoy, and never have to face reality again.

_Voices broke through the silence and we pulled apart. We looked away from each other and listened to the voices, panting from the kiss. We could hear just about everything the voices said, choosing to listen to them instead of facing the effects of our affectionate display. _

_It was a boy and a girl talking, and they were giggling and stumbling through the halls, their voices echoing, bouncing off the walls._

"_Are you sure you aren't with her? She looked upset."_

"_Of course I'm sure, we're just friends, and she doesn't mean anything romantic to me at all."_

"_It was actually kind of pathetic, her running away over something as silly as a kiss."_

"_She is kind of pathetic. She only has two friends and that's only because Harry and I felt sorry for her. She completely pathetic."_

"_Yes, completely."_

"_Come on, the stairs are just round the corner."_

_The two figures came round the corner and stopped dead when they saw us. It was Weasley with Lavender Brown, and boy was it awkward. _

_They had very obviously been talking about Granger, calling her pathetic, and it seemed that Granger had feelings for the Weasel. _

_I wanted to kill him, how dare he talk about her like that?! She was one of his best friends! It was completely ungentlemanly! Nobody should have that done to them, even Granger._

_She had stood up and was staring Weasley in the eye, he had Lavender supressing a laugh and clinging to his arm._

"_Oh... um," Lavender giggled. "Sorry to… disturb you two…" _

_Weasley looked from Granger to me and back to Granger again. He furrowed his eyebrows and stared at Granger, obviously annoyed._

"_Hermione." He hissed "What the bloody hell are you doing with that evil little git? Everyone knows that people use these corridors to…"_

_Lavender interrupted him, she was still giggling and tugging on Weasley's arm._

"_Come on Won Won. You don't need to be around her, she's pathetic remember?" She laughed "Let's go somewhere less… occupied."_

_She turned and skipped back round the corner they came from but Weasley just stood there staring at Granger, disgusted at the company she was keeping, disgusted by me._

"_Hermione…" he began._

_But Granger just aggressively yelled over his words._

"_Oppugno."_

_The birds that had been quietly chirping the entire time flew at him, filled with Grangers rage and they chased him away down the corridor. _

_I could tell she was even more upset than before, she began crying again, her muffled sobs slicing through the silence. _

_She was falling apart, in front of my eyes and I got the feeling she wanted to be alone. I didn't mind, I needed to sleep, and mend the vanishing cabinet, and to put this night behind me._

_Actually what I really needed to do was rebuild my walls, brick by brick, somehow I knew that I couldn't quite undo the damage Granger had done to them, but I needed to try._

_So I got up and began to make my way up the stairs (I didn't want to spend another moment in the corridors that night) but I paused before leaving._

Draco stopped on the stairs. I was a blubbering mess, I had lost one of my best friends who just happened to be the guy I was in love with, yet I had kissed Malfoy.

I wanted to collapse in a puddle on the floor and cry my eyes out, I wanted to fade out of existence and be the pathetic girl that everyone thought I was.

And just as Draco walked away, he said one thing.

"They're wrong about you."

Then he was gone.

I sat at the bottom of the stairs for an eternity, I just sat, I wasn't crying, I wasn't hating Ron, I was thinking about what Draco had said to me.

I sat in silence until I heard more footsteps, Harry sat down and comforted me the way I knew he would, and as I laid my head on his shoulder, I drifted off to sleep, Draco' words filling my mind.


	2. Chapter 2

**Dramione**

They're Wrong About You (2)

**A/N – Thank you for reading, it means a lot, I hope you enjoyed the previous scene, now for the next one. Unfortunately I still don't own any characters etc. (They belong to JKR). It's the same writing: normal is Hermione's POV and **_**italics is Draco's POV. **_**Enjoy!**

I hadn't seen Draco since the night of the Quidditch match. I had attempted to erase it from my memory. He hadn't shown up to any classes or anything, but I had noticed he always went to the room 0f requirement, every day.

I had tried to avoid Ron as well, sort of difficult for a best friend who spends an immense amount of time with Harry and snogs his girlfriend in the middle of the common room, hallways, bathrooms, classrooms, library, basically anywhere. I couldn't stand it, every time I saw them I wanted to cry, in fact, most of the time I did.

I had just tried to blur out of existence and study with Harry. It was hard though, he constantly had girls staring at him, talking to him, and he was stressed about finding out Professor Slughorn's memories of Tom Riddle.

Slughorn's Christmas party had been awkward enough, I had taken Cormac McLaggen because I thought it might annoy Ron the most, but it backfired on me.

It appeared that Cormac had become very attached to me. I managed to get rid of him most of the time, making excuses that I needed to study or wasn't feeling well, but that wasn't always enough. When I couldn't get away he stood unusually close. He constantly had his arm on my shoulder or my waist, and he kept his body almost attached to mine, he always tried to hold my hands and there were too many instances when he began to lean in to kiss me. It was awkward.

I often found myself daydreaming, about what had happened with Draco, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't forget.

_I was in the room of requirement, as usual. I couldn't get the cabinet to work, if I didn't, I was dead. I also hadn't attended my classes since the incident with Granger, in all honesty, I had tried to forget it, tried, and failed. _

_I had blatantly ignored her every time I passed her in the corridors or she called me from across a room. It was for the best, she needed to know that I wasn't ever going to even tolerate her. She was a muggleborn. Voldemort would soon take her out anyway, so what was the point in me talking to her? _

_The room was a mess at the moment, it was a clutter of things because that way nobody would ever find the cabinet. As well as random objects stacked everywhere, it was always dark and the place was completely covered in dust. It looked forgotten. I suppose that was the point._

_I was sat on a black box with a dust sheet on it, I had been in here for two days now and yet again, no progress had been made. _

_It made me so angry! Why couldn't I do this? I got up and kicked the cabinet, yelling in anger and I began picking up anything I could and smashing it on the floor or throwing it at a wall._

_I couldn't do it much longer. That was all that was to be said. I needed to shout and scream, and break something real. Not these random objects that the rom had conjured up for my benefit, I didn't just want to watch things smash, I wanted to truly break it, I wanted to crush and crush and crush it, watch the happiness drain away from it and then leave it to die. Make me feel better about myself._

_Then I felt them, like tiny raindrops falling down my face. I was crying. Me, son of the fearsome Lucius Malfoy and server to the Dark Lord, sat in a dark room, crying. The worst part was, I couldn't stop, I didn't really want to. It felt nice to be able to let it all out, all the pent up emotions._

_I continued to throw things everywhere I could, destroying the room, taking my mind off the problem whilst tears poured down my face and I yelled at the vast emptiness before me._

_I was so preoccupied that I didn't hear anything else until there was a tiny voice. I ceased my smashing, I dropped the vase I was holding and listened to the shards of glass skidding around on the floor. There was a silence ringing in my ears, but the voice came slicing through it, tearing up the still atmosphere, the sameness I had become accustomed to._

"_Draco?" _

Harry and I were talking as we made our way back from one of Slughorn's potion lectures on how to be safe around the cauldron.

We turned the corner to see none other than Lavender and Ron snogging each other's faces off, it looked like Ron was about to swallow her, it was disgusting. All you could hear was their heavy breathing and Lavender calling him 'Won Won'.

The tears came flooding to my eyes and I tried to blink them back, it wasn't going to work. I needed to get out of there, so I turned to Harry, he knew I couldn't stand seeing them together.

"Excuse me while I go and vomit." I said quietly and I walked away quickly.

I could feel the tears falling now and I began to run. I didn't know where I was going, all I knew was that I had to get as far away from Ron as possible. I ran and ran and ran and ran, until I found myself going towards the room of requirement, Draco was bound to be in there, he always was, and I felt like he would be the only one to understand how I felt.

I opened the two huge doors and took a step backwards into the room. I watched as the doors closed and slowly disappeared.

The thud echoed around the room and all that was left was a distant sound of objects breaking. Was that Draco?

It was creepy in the room and my heart was thudding against my chest so hard I felt as though it would leap out at any moment. It was a wonder Draco couldn't hear it.

"Draco?" I choked out through my tears, he didn't respond. He was shouting, yelling, screaming, and it sounded like he might be… crying?

I continued to make my way deeper into the room. It was like a labyrinth of random items, some piled up high, some sprawled across the floor. There was a huge number of things as well. I saw some mannequins, empty pieces of parchment, metal bowls, a fancy green velvet sofa, a tall lamp, a small bed, and a huge cupboard with an entire drawer filled with various silverware. It was odd. Everything in the room was either covered with sheets or a thick layer of dust.

I expected I would never find my way out of here but I didn't care, I wanted, no, needed to find Draco, he would make things seem better again, I didn't know why, but he had to.

I winded my way about the huge room, calling his name out every so often until I came into a slight clearing, Draco was stood there with his back to me, he had just dropped some sort of glass object and it shattered into thousands of tiny pieces that collected around his feet then prayed out everywhere.

There was another silence. Not like the one before though, this was a horrible silence, filled with tension and anger.

"Draco?" I whispered just loud enough for him to hear me. He turned to face me, looking worse than I had ever seen him before.

_I was a mess, I know I was, it hadn't mattered last time because she was a mess as well, this time she only had a few tears staining her cheeks, it made me so angry._

_I turned to her and swept my hand along my eyes, deleting all the tears, all the things that are making me vulnerable, I was about to explode, and Granger would be the only casualty._

"_What Granger? Why are you here?!" I spat at her, I wanted to break her, she was the thing that would I throw my anger at._

"_Draco." She said softly "Are you okay? I came to find you to…"_

_I cut her off._

"_To gloat?! To show me how much happier you are than me?! To come and whine about your petty troubles?!" I yelled._

"_Draco, I only wanted to…" she began, her tears flowing._

"_Only wanted to what?! To cry about how the Weasel doesn't want you?! Well guess what, he doesn't! Why should he?! Look at you! Not even a Weasel could love you Granger, so don't bother with anyone else! Just go back to the library and be the stupid little nerd that everyone thinks you are!" I was going crazy, I needed to watch her suffer._

"_You don't mean that. You're just angry. I thought that you of all people would understand." She was getting angrier now, I could see it in the way she was standing, fists clenched, and jaw tightening._

"_Understand what?!" I shouted, coming right up to her face._

"_What it feels like to be alone!" she yelled back at me. She could see through me, it was as easy for her as it was to fall asleep._

"_Well I can't help you Granger, what did you think I could do?!" _

"_Tell me that you understand!" she yelled, the hurt obvious in her voice "Tell me that he's stupid, tell me that I'll be fine, that he isn't the one who is right for me. Tell me… Tell me that you care, that you have at least a tiny shred of humanity left in you, that you aren't a completely disgusting person!"_

_I looked at her, this was it, she had snapped, she was vulnerable, ripe for the picking, I was ready to destroy something worth destroying._

"_You, Hermione Granger, you are the disgusting one, even Weasley is disgusted by you, because you are worthless, you are nothing but a filthy… little…" I leaned in close to her and whispered the last word ever so quietly into her ear:_

"_Mudblood."_

_I pulled away from her teary, pain filled face and walked away, giving her a sharp push with my shoulder on the way. _

_I kept my footsteps steady and loud until I reached the doors, I waited for them to open fully, casted an eerie glow upon the room, then slammed them shut and set off for my dorm. _

_I walked along the corridors, ignoring the murmurs and dodgy looks cast by other students, I had destroyed Hermione Granger, so why didn't I feel happy about it?_

I heard the huge doors slam shut and the room was consumed in a still silence again. My knees were weak and my heart felt as if somebody had punched a hole in my chest and ripped it into little pieces.

I felt so small in that moment, like one tiny raindrop in a raincloud. My consciousness flickered, I wanted nothing more than to lose it.

I sank to my knees and bit my lip and the shards of glass cut apart my legs, pushing their pain into my soul, I leant against a tall cabinet in the corner of the clearing. It's cool, bumpy surface was like a blast of winter, it was cruel, but I needed it, its bitterness would keep me sane, keep me grounded.

The room had a mind of its own, it knew what each person needed, what they felt like, and it tried to match it. So I sat in a puddle of tears and broken glass, the room had generated a dark and cold atmosphere and a forceful wind swirled around, blowing up odd papers and dust, and the room cried with me.


	3. Chapter 3

**Dramione**

They're Wrong About You

**A/N – Hope you've enjoyed the fanfic so far, (disclaimer) I don't own any of the characters etc. as they belong to the amazing JKR. Same old font thing, **_**Draco in Italics**_** and Hermione in normal writing. IMPORTANT NOTICE: also, there is a little tiny detail to do with Hermione having her 'Mudblood scar from Bellatrix, I know it's set during Half Blood Prince but I decided to make her have it anyway, even if it isn't chronologically correct… Please review and enjoy! **

"_Sectum-Sempera!" _

_A huge force came flying from Potter's wand, I tried to dodge but I was too slow… it hit me. Hard. One moment I am trying to disarm him, the next I'm lying in a puddle of my own blood._

_It was horrible, I couldn't concentrate on anything but the pain, and it was consuming me, in my head, my heart, my stomach, everywhere. Pure torture._

_Potter looked at me then at his wand, his eyes wide in shock at what he had done, at least Potter would suffer from my imminent death. Yes, as I laid on the bathroom floor it seemed that my death was in fact, inevitable. _

_My breathing was now jagged and my whole body twitched and spasmed in pain, I couldn't do anything but watch as Potter's shadow, distorted by the red puddle, slipped off into the darkness, I was left alone. _

_So this was how I was to die, not by Voldemort's wand, not by my Father's wrath, but alone in the boys bathroom at Hogwarts, a place that was supposed to protect me._

_Oddly enough, I wished that Granger was there with me, impossible of course. I had broken her, and even if she were completely shattered, she wouldn't care if I lived or died, I was – am – a Death Eater. I'm on the dark side, just look where that got me. A spoilt little brat that was such a bully that now, in my last moments, I have nothing but pain to keep me company. A pathetic excuse for a Pureblood, for a Malfoy._

_Pureblood, Mudblood, what does it matter now? I'm lying in my own "pure" blood and it can't help me at all, what difference does it make? Had I been smarter, then I would have realised that a lot sooner, maybe I wouldn't be here right now._

_Maybe I wouldn't be alone, in complete agony._

I hadn't seen Draco in a month. I had wanted to, I had been so close to confronting him, telling him that I understand what he is going through. I know it wasn't him talking, it was his father, it was Voldemort, it was the Death Eaters, but it wasn't him, or at least I don't think that it was.

In all honesty, I was petrified that I had somehow, done the unthinkable. I had fallen down the rabbit hole and I couldn't see where I was going, there was no way that I could possibly recover. The truth was, that I had fallen for Draco Malfoy, but he had broken my heart.

After the scene in the Room Of Requirement, I assumed that he didn't really want to talk to me, besides, I did have a few other things on my mind. I had been with Ron.

It wasn't quite right though.

He had said my name after being in the hospital wing for what seemed like forever. He may have been unconscious but he had murmured it nevertheless, the look on Lavender's face was priceless, her darling Won Won, in hospital, the poor thing, but he didn't want her, he only wanted me.

After he woke up and we had explained to him what had happened he didn't appear to be quite as heartbroken as her. She still watched him though, all the time, with a crazed look in her eye, as if she was preparing to jump out any moment and take a bullet for him, it was odd to say the least.

But it still wasn't right, Ron seemed to enjoy my company a lot more than before, he kept gently touching my cheeks or rubbing his thumb round and round on the back of my hand.

No, it was wrong. It wasn't because Ron had changed, it was – despite the complete cliché – me. I was different, something bout Draco, the change in him, well… it had changed me as well.

I was walking to potions when Harry walked past me, the bottom of his trousers were wet and he had his wand out, he looked at me, we made eye contact but he walked straight past.

Something was wrong.

I could see it in his eyes, he had done something, and it was eroding him already, eating away like cancer in his soul.

I watched as he and his shadow rounded the corner towards the common room, then immediately headed in the direction of which he had come.

I felt as though I was doing something wrong. As though any moment I would be caught and expelled. Then I stopped.

The Room Of Requirement was right next to me, Draco was probably in there, my heart fluttered at the thought of being able to talk to him, him keeping his distance had done nothing but make my affections grow, it was horrible, how he could do that to me.

I shook my head and carried on until I found myself standing in a puddle of water, if Harry had seriously made me all worried over something as stupid as him flooding the bathroom then I would be seriously annoyed.

I turned to walk away when I looked down at my now soaked shoes, there was something else in the water, a trickle of something red…

My confusion was met with a strangled moan and I stared back down at the water, the red had spread out, mixing with the clear water until I was just standing in a pool of pure red.

It was blood.

_I heard the sound of splashing, perhaps this wasn't the end I thought I would have, and perhaps I wouldn't die completely alone…_

_The splashing sound stopped, obviously the person had decided they would rather not get their shoes wet, the floor was now an ocean of red, no other colour surrounded me, at the edge of the door and out in the corridor I could see the shadow of the random stranger and my blood swirling around their ankles._

_Then the pain returned, the distraction had been good, it had kept my mind off of the excruciating torment._

_A groan escaped from my lips and the figure moved, my body was twitching and pulsing, my entire being shaking in agony, I had heard the spell Potter used, Professor Snape told me of it. It slashes the victim repeatedly, causing indescribable pain, there is only one counter curse…_

_I have no idea what it is._

_The figure outside the door gasped, I would know that gasp a million miles away and as if to prove my point, Granger's shadows turns round the corner and morphs into her body. She looks perfect compared to me right now. _

_Of course that isn't the point, Granger's presence won't stop me dying, I lov- like. I like the way that she can help to ease the pain simply by standing there, mouth wide open, hair a mess, feet sopping wet._

_I shouldn't count on her being there for very long, not after the way I treated her, she should leave me here to die, it would be easier for everybody._

_But she didn't._

Draco was lying in the middle of the floor, if I had thought that he looked like he couldn't get any worse when he sat with me on the stairs, then I was completely wrong, he looked like death itself.

His entire body was soaked in water, his shirt clung to his body and his hair became matted to his head in a mixture of sweat and blood, he was bleeding severely in several places and he twitched and shook in pain.

I knew what spell had done this and I could probably guess which wizard had done this…

Harry.

He had told me about the spell a while ago, it was in that horrendous potions book of his, it was called 'Sectum-Sempera' and I think it cuts open the target, pain, a lot of pain, oh God, how was Draco bearing it?

I couldn't watch him being in total agony, it hurt me, it felt as though there was a knife being pushed right through my heart.

I ran over and knelt beside him in a pool of his own blood, his pure blood. He was making strangled noises and I found myself crying, he had to make it through this, if not for me, then just for him, knowing he was alive was enough.

"Merlin, what happened Draco? Oh God, how do I fix you?" I asked frantically, his only reoly was a moan as his face screwed up in pain, he was crying, so was I.

He breathing was cut off with a cough and a spurt of blood from his mouth. Oh Merlin, I needed to act nd I needed to act fast, I began performing any enchantment that I could remember but none of them were working. Oh God, What were none of them working?!

"Draco, stay with me… don't you dare die on me!" I cried as more blood was coughed up, his whole boding was trembling violently and he couldn't stop making sounds filled with agony and caused by intense pain.

I was chanting speels all over the place and he was about ot die, it was hopeless. There was only one spell left that I could try that might help… I read it over Harry's shoulder in his book, I wasn't exactly sure what it did.#It was my last hope so I pulled Draco's head into my lap and propped him up against my legs.

"Vulnera Sanentur." I whispered.

_She whispered a spell so queietly that I couldn't properly hear it, I couldn't really hear anything, there was a ringing in my ears and my vision was blurring slightly, I had coughed up blood onto both myself nd Granger, staining our uniforms._

_Why was she doing this? Why? After all I'd done to her, why would she help me?_

_My lost track of my thoughts when I felt the pain ease up, it was by no means gone, but it was slightly more bearable._

_She opened her eyes and stared at me, as though she couldn't believe that it had worked, of course it was going to work, because there isn't anything that Granger couldn't fix with a spell._

_She blinked in surprise then screwed her eyes shut, she murmered it again, just loud enough so that I could hear it._

"_Vulnera Sanentur." She mumbled, I could feel the cut beginning to heal and knit themselves back together. I began to sit up but both the jolt of pain, and Grnagers steady hands, made me lie back down, I suddenly realised for the second time, just how close we were sitting again. I was on her lap, her arms draped over me as she muttered the spell and her hair falling out of the pins that were supposed to restrain it, gently brushing against my face._

_She said it loudly this time, actally, she sort of laughed it, as though she were actually happy about the restoration of my life, but why had she done it?_

_I was still in pain, and my head felt as though I had just been whacked in the face by a bulldozer, but it was as if she were the real counter curse, she was dumbing the pain, but why? _

_I knew that I wouldn't be able to sit up yet, and my clothes were sticking to me as if they were my skin._

_Granger was crying, she wiped away some of the tears and took off her cardigan, using it to wipe away the blood from my face._

_She stopped dead in her tracks, I knew why, I quickly shuffled away from her, ignoring the pain shooting through me._

_She moved towards me._

_I moved further away._

_The water had made my shirt stick to me and become slightly transparent…_

_She could see my dark mark._

It was there, marking his skin, permanently, I knew how that felt, let's just say that my time spent in Malfoy Manor wasn't exactly a happy one.

He backed away from me until he hit a wall, the water from a broken set of sinks was spraying over him, I got up and walked towards him, water dripping from my wet blood stained clothes.

"Granger, get away from me. I'm one of _them_ now, I… I'm evil, I always have been and I always will be." He said, just loud enough for it not to be a whisper.

I sat down next to his trembling body, close enough that our shoulders bumped together, but not as close as we were before.

"Draco," I began, he winced as I said his name, causing me to hesitate before continuing "Scars are part of who you are, believe me, I know. But they don't define you."

I took a deep breath and moved our arms until they were next to each other, his snaking dark mark and my ugly 'mudblood' scar. He looked at them which really caught my attention, he could look at them, Harry could look for a moment but not properly look, Ron can't even think about it without getting angry.

But Draco was like me, he knew what it meant to be branded as something horrible.

"Why did you do it?" he asked quietly. I didn't answer, I didn't know if he would be happy with the truth, if he didn't think his own life was worth saving, then he couldn't understand why I saved him.

"Bellatrix tortured me until I was begging for her to kill me." At this he turned to look at me, our eyes locked and we reflected each others fear, our pain, our suffering.

"She left this scar so that I wouldn't forget, but I don't care. I'm not going to be something that she wants me to be. I had a choice, Draco. We all have a choice. _You_ have a choice. You aren't a bad guy, you don't have to be one of the bad guys."

He looked away and we sat not speaking for a while, it was nice, a meaningful silence is better than meaningless words. You can't hide anything beneath silence like you can words.

_The silence was nice, although it wasn't a silence, it was the sound of us. Despite how corny it sounded, it was the truth, there was never a complete silence, the sound of our heartbeats, our breathing, was silence enough for me._

"_I have to kill Dumbledore." I said. It felt good to say it, to let the words hang out in the open, even if nothing could be done about it._

_I took another deep breath._

"_They're making me kill Dumbledore."_

_Granger studied my face for a few seconds then I spoke again._

"_It's too late." I said shakily "I'm a Death Eater now. Everyone knows it, I'm the dark side. The evil side."_

_She shuffled around, water splashing everywhere, until she was on her knees in front of me, she moved in close, making me shiver._

"_They're wrong about you." She smiled, then she leant in close and pressed her lips against mine, the kiss tasted like blood and tears, but it was the best yet._

_It didn't last long. She pulled away after five seconds, smiled, got up, and walked away._

_I sat there for ages after she had left, the same words I had once said to her in the back of my mind, 'they're wrong about you'. _

_And we were right. _


End file.
